Souls Are Complicated Things
by Lacey Barbed Wire
Summary: Every sentient being in the universe has a Soulmark somewhere on their body-the first two sentences their soulmate spoke directly to them. Nobody knows where they came from, they just know that they're real. No matter how much Loki and El might wish they weren't.
1. Chapter 1

**Words in bold=POV shift**

_Words in italics=El or Loki interjecting in the other's narrative_

Words in underline=standard emphasis

Brackets=Loki responding to El when she interrupts his narrative

**El's POV 1****st**** person**

I want to make one thing perfectly clear here. I am not brave. Not really. Stupid and with poor impulse control? Yes, very much so. Ludicrously overprotective of my younger siblings? Yeah. Brave though? No, not really, I'm still scared of lots of stuff. Heights namely. Really don't like high ledges. Anyway, back to my original point in writing this down. Lately my life's taken a turn for the weird, and I figured I'd document it, if only because writing it down makes me feel less crazy. Occasionally I'll be interrupted

_Interrupted? I was under the impression that you invited me to give a more complete depiction of events._

…As I was saying, occasionally I'll be interrupted by my partner in this nonsense

_Good to know that you view our relationship as nonsense._

First of all, we both agree that the way our relationship started was bull crap. Second of all, for someone who was objecting to me saying that they'd be interrupting me, you sure are cutting me off a lot.

…_My apologies. I'll wait until it's my turn to 'speak', shall I?_

Thank you. You are unbanished from the couch tonight.

_I was being banished to the couch tonight?_

…

_Sorry. By all means, continue._

Anyway, back on track. So, I was in Stuttgart Germany on 2012. My grandmother had died the year before, and in her will had left my parents enough money that they could justify splurging to go on a family trip to Europe, which was something they'd always wanted to do but were too thrifty to do so despite our more than decent financial situation. Unfortunately (from their point of view) the will made it clear that they had to bring the whole family, including me. Unlike my parents, my grandmother did not hate me, even if she refused to call me El, preferring my birth name, which I will not be writing down until I absolutely have to. At any rate, we were at an art showing…thing in Stuttgart (I didn't speak German back then, so I was a bit lost) when he showed up. Loki waltzed in, smacked one guy to the ground with his staff, and then threw the professor who was speaking (I assume he was a professor anyway. Once again, I didn't German at the time) and slammed some device down onto his eye, which made the poor guy start convulsing violently, at which point everyone rightfully freaked out and started running away, myself and my family included. Unfortunately for us, he followed, shifting his clothing from a rather nice looking suit to something that looked like a background character in a weird 1970's or 1980's movie. A police car came rushing towards the scene, but he flipped it with a blast of blue energy.

And then he started making clones (holograms actually, but I didn't know that at the time) that herded us into a tight group. "Kneel before me." He demanded. We milled around, but nobody actually kneeled. "I said…KNEEL! " He yelled, making a flash of blue light from his staff. And so people began kneeling. Except for me. I crouched, fishing through my bag. I knew two things. Firstly, that there was a crazy guy who had superpowers, a big ego, a terrible fashion sense, and absolutely no problems with killing people in front of us. And two, that two of my younger brothers had ADHD and very little sense of self preservation, and I did not want them to die because the crazy guy decided he didn't like them fidgeting, so I needed to provide a distraction. I began slowly making my way forward as he surveyed the crowd, chuckling. "Is not this simpler?" He asked as I finally got a hold of my pepper spray. "Is this not your natural state?" I got level with him. "It's the unspoken truth of humanity that you crave subjugation." At which point I stood up and sprayed him in the face with the pepper spray until it stopped coming out.

**Loki's POV, 3****rd**** person**

Loki reeled back as the mortal girl sprayed him in the face with the acidic liquid. Enraged that this little human would dare attack him, however trivial the attack, he lashed out with his free hand, grabbing her by her shirt and lifting her up. It wasn't enough to just kill her, he needed to make her feel small first, to realize just how much of an ant she was. And then, she spoke. "Killed by an extra from Caligula. Huh, didn't see that coming." Shocked, Loki dropped her and took a step back, staring. Those were the words. The words written on his right forearm, the words that he'd been puzzling over ever since he'd entered adolescence and the Soulmark had appeared. The words had made no sense, there was no Caligula in the history of Asgard. They still made no sense to him, but now he knew why. "You must be joking." He spat. "A mere mortal?" As soon as the last word left his mouth, the girl stopped scrambling back from him and stared up at him in shock.

**El's POV, 1****st**** person**

"You must be joking. A mere mortal?" I stopped and stared up at the madman, stunned. Those were the words that were wrapped around my right ankle like a bracelet, the words that had confused the crap out of me ever since they first appeared when I was thirteen. Back before the Age of Superheroes, the idea of one person calling another a 'mere mortal' was just weird. And the psychological effect of knowing that your soulmate was going to be repulsed by you when you met wasn't very good either. I think that the utter bizarreness of my Soulmark was one of the reasons my parents didn't like me very much, but I never really asked so I can't know for sure.

At any rate, further thought and action was cut off by a man in a blue suit dropping down from the sky in between Loki and I. My eyes got wider as I recognized Captain America from my history books, one of the few subjects I'd done well at in school. "You know, the last time I was in Germany it saw a man standing above everybody else." He said casually, walking towards the Caligula man. (I didn't know Loki's name at the time, sue me. It wasn't exactly public knowledge yet.) "We ended up disagreeing."

**Loki's POV, 3****rd**** person**

"The soldier." Loki mocked, aiming his staff. "The man out of time." He'd wondered when one of these so called heroes would show up. The appearance of the girl had changed his plans slightly though. He needed her to come along, his sense of curiosity demanded it. What could there possibly be to this girl that made her worthy of being his soulmate?

_Loving the arrogance there. It's really attractive._

[Now who's interrupting?]

_Why aren't you writing your sections in 1__st__ person?_

[Three reasons. One, it's your record, not mine. Second of all, it comes off too much like a villainous monologue when I do it. And three, this is not a part of my life that I'm particularly proud of. Writing it as an unattached narrator makes reliving it slightly easier]

_Aw, come here._

[Hugs don't cure everything. All the same, thank you Sweet. Now, where was I? Ah yes]

"I'm not the one who's out of time." The soldier said as a human aircraft came into the area, a gun lowering from the underbelly.

"Loki, drop the weapon and stand down." A female voice demanded over a projection system. Loki snorted slightly and rolled his eyes before shooting a blast of energy from his staff, forcing the craft to take evasive maneuvers. Captain America threw his shield at Loki, forcing the Asgardian back a step, then rushed forward. Loki, used to sparring with Asgardians when he was forced to practice physically fighting, had no problem fending off the man, strong as he was. Just as he'd forced the Captain to the ground, loud Midgardian music began playing from the human craft, and the one they called Iron Man flew in, sending out a burst of energy that knocked Loki off his feet. His original plan had been to play completely helpless, but he needed to bargain now, so he kept hold of his staff.

"Make a move reindeer games." Iron Man said flatly, weapons at the ready and aimed at Loki. The Asgardian looked at them, keeping his staff pointed at the ground and generally trying to present an air of 'not a threat at the moment, but could be a threat soon'.

"I will surrender," He said slowly. "If, she comes with us." The girl, who was, incredibly enough, still in the square and standing relatively nearby with her can of pepper spray in one hand looked at him, startled.

**El's POV**

My family had run off in the confusion, leaving me behind. Not that I blamed them in the slightest. I would have told them to run if they'd been so stupid as to stay quite frankly. This left me with nothing more than a can of pepper spray (and my book, but I hadn't found anything in it that would have been useful in this situation at that point in time. More on that later.) All the same, when Captain America went down, I inched closer, hoping to give him a little respite. Hopefully this Loki wouldn't want to kill me quite yet, because of the whole soulmate thing. So I was there when Iron Man knocked the madman on his ass, and when said madman demanded that I come with them. "You're not exactly in a position to make demands." Captain America pointed out. Loki just raised an eyebrow and twitched his staff ever so slightly, reminding them that he was still armed. "Why do you want her?"

"We…have complimentary Soulmarks." I muttered. It wasn't something that thrilled me. Captain America's eyes widened, and he looked from me to Loki and back again.

"Pretty sure you're not going to get congenial visits where you're going." Iron Man said dryly. I glared at him.

"Even if he could get them the only Happy Time partner he'd have is his right hand." I snapped.

"Those are my terms." Loki said blandly. "Either take them, or things get…messy." There was a moment's pause as the two heroes looked at each other, and then at me.

"Ma'am?" Captain America asked slowly. I sighed, pinching the bridge of my nose with my free hand. If they were willing to negotiate, I couldn't exactly say no. I had enough of a conscience to not want to put more people at risk just so I wouldn't have to be on the same plane as this Loki guy.

"Fine. But I want a ride home when you've got…whatever this is sorted out." I said, putting the pepper spray back in my bag. Loki smirked and carefully set down his staff, his Caligula outfit dissolving in gold light as he did so. I felt a sudden urge to wipe that smirk off his face, but if Captain America couldn't knock him down, I knew I couldn't do it. And I'd wasted enough pepper spray as it was. So I ignored him and followed the three men into odd plane thing setting down on the square. A woman came out as another soldier ran and grabbed his staff. The woman frowned and looked me, then at the two heroes.

"Who's she?"

"Condition of Loki's surrender." I said dryly, walking up the ship's ramp and sitting down on the seat closest to the pilot's seat.

"Pretty much, yeah." Iron Man said, taking off his helmet and following me up. (Which left me with the weird question of, did I call him Iron Man, or Mr. Stark? It's like when you're growing up and you know your best friend's parent's first name. Do you call them Mr. and/or Mrs. or their first name? Ultimately I decided to just call him Mr. Stark until someone told me not to.) As I strapped myself in Captain America (Steve Rogers if I remembered correctly. I figured I'd call him Captain Rogers) shoved Loki into his own seat and strapped him in before walking off to talk to Mr. Stark. I looked at Loki, frowning as I studied my apparent soulmate. He…was kind of really really handsome. Frankly if he wasn't an arrogant, homicidal maniac I'd say that he was really pretty hot. But he was, and I do try to take a person's personality into account when I start crushing on them, so he lost of his hotness as a result. I shook my head and pulled my book out of my bag.

**Loki's POV**

Loki's head snapped up as the girl pulled out a thick book from her bag, which was barely big enough to accommodate the tome. The amount of magic emanating from the text was immense, filling the small craft in waves. His interest in his apparent soulmate immediately doubled. A regular mortal should have been destroyed by the amount of magic that was filling the air around her, let alone the amount that the book was pouring directly into her. Where had she found one of the Great Tomes? He pushed the thought aside for the moment, instead looking her up and down. To his disappointment, she was no great beauty. Not by Asgardian standards at any rate.

She was about as tall as Sif from what he could tell, but without the same strong build. Instead she was rather slender, her build not suggesting that she often performed any vigorous physical activity. Not unlike his own really-not unfit, but not athletic. Her hair was dark brown, very thick and long, falling just past her shoulder blades, her skin pale, though not as pale as his, and her eyes a gray-blue. She was dressed in what Loki assumed was the current Midgardian fashion, an elegant black dress and similarly colored high heeled shoes, an outfit that looked fine enough but didn't really stand out in any noteworthy way. Her chest, admittedly, was on the larger side but not exceptionally so. Ultimately she wasn't someone he'd have looked twice at if she was in a crowd, even if she had been Asgardian. But she was his soulmate, which meant that she had to have something that was exceptional about her. He hoped there was more to her than just the fact that he owned that book, whatever it was.

**Author's Notes**

Hey guys! Thanks for reading! So, this is my first story like this so please be kind when you review, but still let me know if you think that it's crap. I really don't want El to become a Mary Sue, so please let me know if you think she's leaning that way. I will explain where she got that book Loki's so interested in, don't worry. It's actually a plot point.

If you know of any good Loki redemption fics, please point me their way.

Once again, thanks for reading! Please review!


	2. Chapter 2

**Words in bold=POV shift**

_Words in italics=El or Loki interjecting in the other's narrative_

Words in underline=standard emphasis

Brackets=Loki responding to El when she interrupts his narrative

We made back to the giant flying aircraft carrier (I didn't get told what everything was called, sue me. From here on out I'll refer to it as the Helicarrier) with only one real incident. Admittedly, said incident was freaking Thor coming and grabbing Loki out of the ship, leading to a big fight between him, Captain Rogers, and Mr. Stark. (And yes, that was what finally made the whole Norse God thing click for me with regards to my apparent soulmate. I never claimed to be particularly bright. Ow!)

_I told you that you would get flicked on the head every time you insulted yourself._

What about the whole opening paragraph of the last chapter?

_Thank you for reminding me._

Ow! You're definitely sleeping on the couch tonight. Anyway, back to my story. We reached the Helicarrier without further incident after getting attacked by a Norse god who was really just an alien…and my life reached a really weird point where I could say that in all seriousness. The man in charge of the ship, who, in a wonderful show that destiny has a sense of humor, had an eye patch, and had two guards take me to a random bedroom elsewhere on the ship, after checking my bag. Fortunately, from what I've gathered from people's questions when asking me if I like what I'm reading, everyone else just sees the book as Harry Potter Five. At any rate, I was left in a bedroom and promptly ignored for the next few hours. Which was perfectly okay with me. I had no delusions of grandeur. If Mr. Stark, Captain Rogers, an alien/god with weather powers, and an entire flying aircraft carrier were working together, then whatever Loki had done was way bigger than just what I'd seen in Germany, and I'd be no help whatsoever. So instead I sat down on the bed and started reading, starting back at the beginning.

To explain, yes, I have a magic book. And by that I mean both that it's a book with magic spells in it, and that it's magical itself. I got it in a…interesting way. And by interesting I do not mean illegal! You see, growing up in Arizona I lived next to this guy named Doctor Stephen Strange. Yes, his last name was Strange. He was a nice guy if reclusive at times. One day, when I was fourteen, I was taking care of his plants and cat while he was on vacation and I found a book on the kitchen table. It was large and bound in brown leather, with two gold snake/dragon things wrapped around a sword on the cover. Being curious, I opened it, and promptly got a paper cut. Not wanting to get blood on the expensive looking book, I quickly closed it and moved on, hurrying up and watering the plants before leaving. When I got home though, the book was on my bed. More than a little weirded out by this, I put it on a shelf and decided to return it the next day.

The next day however, a moving van came and took all of Doctor Strange's stuff away. I gave the guy who was in charge the book, he thanked me and gave me an envelope from Doctor Strange. It had a check for the work I'd done and a short letter explaining that something had come up and he was moving immediately. I compared it to the list of rules he'd given me for taking care of his house and the handwriting matched up, so I decided it was legit and cashed the check. The day after that, I woke up to find the book on my bed. Now thoroughly freaked out, I quickly took the book out to the trash can and threw it away, watching as garbage truck picked it up. The day after that the book was back, so I took it and dumped it in the school dumpster. And guess what? The book came back. I then went out into the desert that Saturday and burned it. It burned to ash alright, but when I got home it was already back on my bed.

After that, I just kind of gave in and started reading the damn thing. Learning the spells it contained was not easy. Imagine trying to learn Russian by picking up a book that was written in Russian with a Latin alphabet. You can sort of figure out what it should sound like, but not easily. I had to go out into the desert after the first spell I tried froze my dresser to practice, and it was largely a trial and error deal. Lots of cacti died (I don't care if cacti is only the Latin plural, it's a fun word to say) in my quest to teach myself magic, but I like to think that it was a worthy sacrifice. Regardless, I'd noticed that the more I read, the simpler the incantations for spells I'd already mastered (relatively speaking) became. I had to go back and relearn things, but at least I no longer had to recite a whole paragraph to cause a burst of freezing energy. I wasn't going to practice anything on the flying ship, that was just asking for something to go horribly wrong, but I had noticed that the fireball spell had just shortened down to five words, and that a new diagram thing had appeared in the most recently cleared page. That was another thing. Most of the pages were jumbled up gibberish, but occasionally a new one would clear up. I don't know if the book was judging my skill level or what, but there you go. I couldn't quite make out what the new spell was, but it looked much more complicated than the other spells. From what I could tell, it required a painted or otherwise drawn pentagram and five candles. I made a mental note to get to work studying that, after I'd memorized the new fireball spell.

A few hours later a woman in her early thirties/late twenties with brown hair wearing a navy blue uniform walked into the room. "Габриелле Park?"

_Are you honestly translating your name into the Cyrillic alphabet?_

I really don't like my first name, sue me.

_I don't understand your aversion._

I'm a woman, I don't have to justify anything. Now stop interrupting. Now where was I…, oh right. I nodded in response. "That's me." I said, shutting the book.

"My name's Maria Hill. We've run a thorough background check, and it came back clean, but we're going to have ask that you remain in this room when not accompanied by a guard. This is still a military vessel." I shrugged. That was about what I expected, and I'd be lying if I claimed that I was disappointed.

"No problem. But if I do need to use the bathroom or something…"

"There's a button next to the door." She finished for me, pointing at said button. "If you need food, water, or to use the facilities and a guard will arrive shortly. Is there anything you need now?" I looked down at myself.

"Clothes that aren't a cocktail dress and heels would be nice." I admitted. She nodded.

"What sizes?" I paused.

"Uh, in jeans I'm size 10 according to Lee." I said slowly. "And I'm a medium from Volcom." She raised an eyebrow.

"You didn't get that dress by yourself, did you?" She asked.

"I stood still for the fitting and that's about it." I admitted frankly. Maria chuckled.

"And shoes?"

"Eight."

"I assume that's US?" I blinked.

"Most likely." I didn't know there were different sizes for different countries, though I suppose it made sense.

"I'll see what I can find for you." She said, turning to leave.

"Thanks."

**Seven hours later**

I woke up with a start when the ship lurched to one side sharply, a huge explosion filling the air. Considering the fact that I was on a giant flying metal ship, the possibility of crashing was enough to make me panic more than a little. I'd discovered a force field spell, but I didn't exactly know the upward limits of it, and I doubted that it could protect me from a hundred tons or so of steel crashing down on me after falling several thousand feet. I stared at the door, not sure what to do, when I heard gunfire. That settled that. Now was not the time to test my reaction times and whether or not my force fields could stop bullets. I opened up my book and flipped to the page about the force field spell. "Rise and guard, Lights of the Horizon." A little melodramatic, but better than bad Latin. A wall of solid purple light formed and put itself up around the door before turning invisible. I wasn't sure if it would stop bullets, but at the very least it would hopefully slow any attackers down.

Of course, that didn't solve the problem of the fact that I was on a crashing flying ship. I hadn't found a flight spell yet, so that was out. The gunshots meant I really didn't want to go wandering around looking for a parachute either. And then, because things weren't bad enough already, the roar of something massive filled the air. "Of freaking course." I moaned. At least I was in decent clothes now. Jeans, a white wife beater that unfortunately made my navy blue bra visible, but whatever at least it wasn't a cocktail dress, and boots. If I had to run away, at least I could now without fear of breaking an ankle. Then the door slid open, and a man in black combat gear bounced off the force field.

"What the hell?" The man demanded. I looked at them warily.

"Who are you and what do you want?" I asked slowly, book open to the new fireball incantation because fire would probably cause less damage to the metal than ice or pure kinetic energy.

"Lord Loki has asked us to ensure that you got to the escape ship safely." The other man said. I gulped and looked at the two men. It looked like I needed a new hiding place.

"Uh, thanks but no thanks." I said, holding out my hand, palm towards the door. "Strike out, Lights of the Horizon." The wall of magic shot forward, slamming the two into the wall behind them. I stepped out, only to find three more men waiting for me, all dressed the same as the two I'd just knocked unconscious with guns pointed at me. "Don't you have a ship to be attacking?" I groaned, shoving my book into my bag. I was not faster than three guys with automatic weapons.

"We have new orders." One of them said, gesturing with the rifle. "This way please."

**Loki POV**

Loki raised an eyebrow as two men escorted his soulmate up the ramp as the human aircraft began to slowly make its ascent. "Were there not five of you?" He asked.

"A SHIELD agent managed to kill one of us sir." The leader of the small squad said respectfully as his counterpart forced the girl into a seat opposite Loki. "She dispatched two more of us when we first located her." Loki gave the girl an interested look.

"So you do know how to actually use that book of yours." He said. She snorted.

"Yep, that's how I took them out. I hit them on the head with a thick book. Your guys were really quite pathetic." Loki smirked. He could appreciate wit.

"I think you know exactly what I mean." He said, leaning back as the craft sped up on its way to Stark Tower. "What spell did you use?" She stared at him warily, then looked away, shifting nervously.

"Force field." She said simply, looking determinedly at the cockpit. Loki nodded, then realized he had made a bit of an oversight.

"…What is your name?" That got her attention. The mortal girl looked at him for a long moment, and Loki forced himself to not notice that the shirt she wore was a little tight for her chest.

"El Park." Loki raised an eyebrow, but didn't comment. He could tell that 'El' wasn't her real name, but he wasn't going to call her out on her lie. It would have served no purpose.

"I am Loki of Jotunheim, former Prince of Asgard." He said politely. El's defeat two of his brainwashed puppets, while no great feat for him, was somewhat impressive for a mortal who he doubted was older than two decades and had earned her enough respect for him to be a little polite. For the moment at least. She was still only a human after all.

"…Interesting to meet you." El said after a moment's pause. Loki smirked and nodded.

"Likewise." He said honestly.

**Author's Notes**

I hope I didn't make Loki seem too nice there at the end. I don't really view Loki as a Death Eater. I think he's at least capable of acknowledging a human's skills and amounting them some slight amount of respect, even if he thinks they're inferior to them. As always, if you think I'm making El a Mary Sue, please point it out either as a review/comment or a PM.

Thanks for reading guys! Please review!


	3. Chapter 3

**Words in bold=POV shift**

_Words in italics=El or Loki interjecting in the other's narrative_

Words in underline=standard emphasis

Brackets=Loki responding to El when she interrupts his narrative

I looked around as we stepped off the aircraft and onto the balcony of Stark Tower, Loki ahead of me and the two guards behind me. "Well, at least you found a nice place to hole up." I said slowly. "What's the thing on the roof?"

"A portal." Loki said simply as we entered the actual penthouse. "Soon it will open and unleash my army upon this pathetic world and then…" He turned and looked at me with a smirk. "I will rule."

"If it's so pathetic, why do you want it?" I asked, walking around and taking a look at everything. It was Tony Stark's penthouse, damn straight I was checking everything out.

"Under my rule Earth will become a stronger place, a glorious place." I looked at him and raised an eyebrow.

"So you're violently taking over the planet for altruistic reasons. Yeah, I believe that." I snorted before turning and plopping down on the couch. I crossed my legs up underneath me and pulled out my book, flipping to the pentagram diagram. Like I said, I was under no illusions. Taking down two, unsuspecting, not technically hostile, men was very different from taking on the freaking God of magic. I wasn't protecting my siblings in this case, and thus most of my bravado was gone. Suddenly something clicked in my brain, and I stared at the diagram as it suddenly made a lot more sense. I was so engrossed in the diagram that it took me a second to realize that Mr. Stark had arrived and walking towards the bar. He nodded at me as he selected a drink.

"Hey kid. Make yourself comfortable."

"Already on it." I assured him. He smirked as Loki turned and walked to look out the window at Manhattan.

"The Chitauri are coming. Nothing will change that." He said, his voice a strange mix of anger and gloating before turning back to look at Mr. Stark. "What have I to fear?"

"The Avengers." Mr. Stark looked up as he poured a drink, and, recognizing me and Loki's confused look, clarified. "It's what we call ourselves. It's sort of like a team. Earth's mightiest heroes type thing." Loki chuckled.

"Yes. I've met them." He said smugly. Mr. Stark smirked.

"Yeah, it takes us a while to get any traction, I'll give you that one. But let's do a head count here. Your brother, the demigod." I winced at that. Strictly speaking, Thor wasn't a demigod. I'd read Percy Jackson, I knew that a demigod was the child of a god and a mortal. I was going to have find a way to get Mr. Stark copies of the Percy Jackson series. "And you, big fella, you've managed to piss off every single one of them."

"That was the plan." Loki said, and I resisted the urge to groan. My soulmate was an arrogant, homicidal maniac. I mean, I'd already sort of known that, but this was just hammering the point in even more, and it wasn't good.

"Not a great plan." Mr. Stark said, echoing my thoughts exactly. "When they come, and they will, they'll come for you."

"I have an army."

"We have a Hulk." I laughed.

"Can't argue with that. Point Mr. Stark." I said, because I just couldn't help myself. Loki glared at me over his shoulder.

"Be quiet." He snapped.

"Here's what you don't get." Mr. Stark said, glaring at Loki. "Even if your army comes, even if it's too much for us, it's still all on you. Because if we can't protect the Earth you can be damn well sure we'll avenge it." Loki stalked towards him, staff starting to glow.

"How will your friends have time for me, when they're so busy fighting you?" He hissed, tapping the staff against Mr. Stark's chest. There was a loud 'ding' as the staff hit the arc reactor and did absolutely nothing. Loki frowned and tried again, with the same non result. "This usually works." He muttered. Mr. Stark nodded understandingly.

"Well, performance issues," He winced. "Not uncommon. One out of five…" Loki lunged forward and grabbed him by the throat as I started laughing again.

"A Viagra joke? Dude, Loki, you're totally losing this conversation."

"I said, be quiet!" Loki snapped, throwing Mr. Stark across the room as he did so.

"JARVIS, any time now." Mr. Stark muttered as he started to pick himself up. Loki got to him first, lifting him by the neck once more.

"You will all fall before me." Loki hissed.

"Deploy!" Mr. Stark yelled right before Loki threw him out the window. A split second later, something large and red flew right past Loki and me, crashing through the window and flying down. Five seconds later, Iron Man was in front of the window. "And there's one other person you pissed off." He said angrily. "His name was Phil." Mr. Stark blasted Loki before my stupid soulmate could attack him.

_It's a good thing I agree with you that I stupid and insane at this point in time, otherwise all these insults could be considered emotional abuse._

But you do agree with me, so shut up. Anyway, there was a loud rumbling, Mr. Stark looked up, then flew away. "What was that?" I demanded, frowning. Loki smirked as he picked himself up.

"The Chitauri have arrived." He headed for the balcony, and I watched in shock and horror as small craft flew by, firing lasers into the city below before turning back to the book. If I was right, this diagram was the best chance I had of helping. I vaguely noticed that outside Loki was fighting Thor, and that he'd made himself look like an extra from Caligula again, but I was a bit preoccupied, and I couldn't exactly hear what they were saying anyway, so I didn't really pay attention. I frowned and stood up, walking over to the bar while consulting my books.

"May I ask what you're looking for miss?" A somewhat stuffy voice asked. I jumped and looked around, before remembering a thing on the internet I read about Mr. Stark having an AI running most of his buildings and stuff.

"I think I can close the portal, at least temporarily, but I need paint, and five candles." There was a pause.

"There is paint on the fifteenth floor, in the third storage closet." JARVIS said, opening the elevator doors. And there are an assortment of scented candles in Miss Potts' room. Will those be suitable?" I looked at the book as I got inside the elevator.

"They should work fine, so long as they have wicks." I said after a second.

**Five minutes later**

I looked at the pentagram I'd made on the gravel, with the machine that was making the portal in its center. (I wasn't sure why Mr. Stark had decided to cover the roof of his building in gravel, but whatever) nodded, and settled down into the circle at the northwestern point in the lotus position, putting my hands in the two smaller circles in the perimeter of my circle, careful not to touch the painted parts. I still had a good amount of paint, but time was of the essence here. "Star of the ancients, protector of the innocent, guardian of the helpless, guide of the lost, accept this my offering. Take my energy and shield these people. Stop this destruction." My hands glowed purple and magic surged into the pentagram, creating a dome around the portal machine. It cut off the beam flowing from it, closing the portal. A few more things flew through it, but only the small fry. I grinned in triumph for a moment. And then the energy drain hit me.

I bit back a scream. All magic comes with a price. Normally that's just a drain from the magical core, the source of all the magic in a person's body, and it replenishes at a fairly steady rate. (Most people don't have a core, and as such are unaffected by ambient magic and magical draining artifacts, though the tradeoff was that they couldn't cast spells.) This spell though, wasn't just taking my magic. It was taking my life force, slowly aging me. Whatever was powering the portal device was really powerful, because it was taking a lot of life to keep it contained. After what seemed like forever, but Natasha assures me was only five minutes, there was the noise of someone rolling across the gravel. I looked up as a beautiful redheaded woman in a catsuit walked up to me. "Ma'am, are you doing alright?" I smirked.

"Peachy." I bit out. "Did you know, when I started this I was eighteen? Judging from my hands I must be eighty by now."

"More like seventy." She said, assessing the situation. "You're the one keeping the portal shut then?"

"No, it was the Penguins of Madagascar." I bit out. I was in far too much pain to be polite. "I'm just sitting here for fun." She gave me a concerned look.

"How much longer can you last?" She asked. In response I gasped, a shudder wracking my body.

"Five minutes?" I guessed after I'd regained my composure.

"Any way to lengthen that time?" I paused, trying to picture the page of the book relating to this spell in my book. I nodded at the bucket of paint.

"If you could paint a line and a perfect circle big enough to fit one of those Chitauri things without smudging the paint from each of the other points, then throw a still living one in each of them, I could drain their life force instead of mine. It would rejuvenate me and extend the time the shield works. And no, I don't know by how much because I don't know how long these things would live before dying of old age." Natasha nodded and touched her earpiece.

"Did you hear that Stark?" I assume he did, because a minute later two badly mangled but still breathing Chitauri crashed into the roof. Natasha got to work painting the circles and lines. Just as she'd finished, two more Chitauri in equally bad condition landed, this time courtesy of Thor. To my surprise, Natasha was able to easily pick up the Chitauri and set them down in the middle of the circles. It took me a second to recalibrate the spell, but then there was a surge of energy and I was able to breathe easy again. I let out a sigh of relief as the pain receded.

"Sorry for, you know, being a bitch." I said, looking apologetically at Natasha. "I was in severe pain, but still..."

"I've heard worse." Natasha said dismissively, shrugging. Suddenly, there was a roar, followed by the shattering of glass and the building shook.

"What was that?" I demanded, looking around.

"Stark and Thor have been playing interference to keep Loki from getting here and reopening the portal." Natasha reported as an older man who'd been lying unconscious near the edge of the roof slowly sat up, looking around in confusion. "One of those worm things attacked them, and Loki broke away. Clint shot him out of the sky, and he landed on the tower balcony. Apparently that noise was Hulk tackling him through a window." I chuckled.

"Nice."

"The Scepter." Natasha and I looked over at the older man, who was now peering over the ledge of the roof.

"Doctor." Natasha said, taking a step towards him.

"Loki's Scepter." He said, ignoring her. "The energy. The Tesseract can't fight…You can't protect against yourself."

"It's not your fault, you didn't know what you were doing." Natasha assured him, crouching down next to him. I raised an eyebrow. That…was an odd response from my perspective. Yeah The Doctor had explained that with a Shatner degree of disjointedness, but the intent of his speech was fairly obvious. He stared at her for a long moment.

"Well actually I think I did. I built in a safety to cut the power source." Natasha paused for a moment, processing this.

"Loki's Scepter." She said after a second.

"It may be able to close the portal." The Doctor confirmed, before turning his head and looking down at the balcony below. "And I'm looking right at it."

**Five minutes later**

I looked up as Natasha walked over, Loki's staff in her hands. "You're going to have to drop the shield." She said, looking down at me. I nodded, took a deep breath, and let go, drawing what remained of the Chitauri's life force into me. It turned out these things could live for an impressively long time. I paused as memories rushed through my head, what remained of the Chitauri's brains filling me with knowledge. Just as Natasha was about to stab the Tesseract I shot my hand out, grabbing her wrist.

"Don't." I said quickly. "I've got a better plan." Natasha stared down at me.

"What are you talking about?" She demanded.

"The Chitauri are a hive mind, controlled by a mother ship on the other side of that portal. Destroy the mother ship and we destroy the Chitauri. If we just destroy the portal though, you've got to take out a whole army of the things still, and there's really just the 6 of you doing any real damage."

"And how do we destroy the mother ship?" Natasha was still impatient, but she sounded more willing to listen at the moment. All things considered, the impatience was understandable.

"…How fast can SHIELD get a nuke over here?" She stared at me, then hit her earpiece for a second time.

"Fury?" Natasha asked. There was a pause. "Three minutes, got it. Everyone clear on the plan?" There was another long pause. "That's a good question. How do we get it to hit the mother ship?" She asked, looking at me. I held out my hand and the book flew to me.

"Glad that worked." I muttered softly. I'd really just been inspired by watching Thor do it with his hammer, and wanted to try it myself. I opened it, hoping for another miracle. I turned the page with the pentagram on it to reveal that the words of the next page had settled into a coherent spell. Specifically a guidance spell designed to perfectly aim projectiles.

…_That is a remarkably specific spell. It seems somewhat superfluous. _

The book is from the Middle Ages, alright? I'm sure it was a lot more useful back then. Anyway, I got up and walked over to the ledge, reading the book. There was minute of waiting and me just reading the book, making sure that I wouldn't stumble over the words. "Alright, Stark's on his way." I nodded, and as soon as he entered my field of vision started reading, focusing on the image of the mother ship from the Chitauri memories.

"Spirts of the wind, patrons of war, guides of the desperate, accept this my offering. Make this missile fly true." I thrust my hand out, sending purple energy to coat the nuke as Mr. Stark flew by. Right as he neared the portal Iron Man let go, sending the nuke through the portal. The second it closed Natasha stabbed the Tesseract with the Scepter, closing the portal. There was a pause, then she gave me a smile.

"It worked." I sighed in relief and sat down. Whatever the hell the Tesseract was, it had a lot of power. Even while draining the life out of four Chitauri, suppressing its energy had taken a lot out of me. Add that to the drain of the targeting spell and I needed to take a nap. I was so tired I didn't even think to freak out about how high up we were, and how close to the edge I was. Natasha walked over and put a hand on my shoulder as Iron Man landed on the balcony, having carried a guy with a bow up, followed closely by Thor, who was carrying Captain Rogers.

"It's not quitting time quite yet." She said. I looked up at her in confusion.

"Uh, the Chitauri are dead. So unless they had a human army helping them, I think I can take a nap."

"Loki's not dead." I blinked.

"I fail to see what that has to do with me. Because I really doubt I can pin him down with magic, if that's what you're hoping." She rolled her eyes and pulled me to my feet.

"C'mon kid." I sighed again, this time in dejection, and followed. As we got onto the balcony, Mr. Stark nodded at me.

"Nice job kid." He said with a smile, then did a double take.

"What?" I asked warily. He looked at me, blinking.

"Weren't you a brunette a few minutes ago?" I stared at him.

"What?" Mr. Stark looked at Natasha.

"Really? You didn't tell her?"

"We were in the middle of an alien invasion, her hair color was not my first priority." Natasha sighed. I looked at them, then grabbed some of my hair and held it in front of my face. While it was as thick as ever, and still felt and looked healthy, it was very, very silver. I groaned and let it fall down.

"Great. So my soulmate is a homicidal maniac with ego issues, New York got invaded and a lot of people probably died, and now I have old woman hair." Yes, those were rather petty issues, but I was eighteen, I was allowed to be a little self-centered.

_She said from the lofty age of twenty-four_

Shut up. Thor gave me a startled look. "You are my brother's soulmate?" I shrugged uncomfortably.

"That's what the words on my ankle say." Thor patted me on the shoulder, and while it was a little forceful it wasn't so hard I was knocked on my ass.

"It is strange." He said slowly. "Not so long ago I would have been happy for you. Now though…" He shook his head. "Come, let us deal with my errant brother." I hung back as the others headed inside.

"C'mon, we don't have all day." Mr. Stark said, waving me over.

"Uh…I'm not sure I should…" He rolled his eyes.

"Kid, you closed the portal seven minutes into the invasion, keeping about a thousand of those Chitauri things out of the city and saving who knows how many lives." He said. "I think you've earned the right to glare at Loki." I couldn't really argue with that, so I followed him inside. I was still more than a little uncomfortable.

_You shouldn't have been. You were the third most intimidating person in the room._

You know that when they say never insult your girlfriend, that doesn't mean you can't admit that she's not as intimidating as a superhero, right? That's not really an insult and ow! Stop flicking me! How was that insulting myself?

_Do I need to get Steve in here to lecture you about how you are in fact a good, brave person again?_

No! Hell no, it's bad enough I'm going to have to write that down later and relive it. My point was that I wasn't exactly a hero at the time. Ow!

_What do you call saving thousands of lives?_

…I need to start wearing a helmet around you. I wonder if Tony would make me one.

_I think he would probably build a robot to help me._

…Probably. Now then, back to the story. Loki slowly picked himself up so that he was sitting on the steps, looking at us. I was glaring at him, book in hand, just in case. In case of what I wasn't sure, but whatever. "If it's all the same to you, I think I'll have that drink now." He said slowly. Hulk growled, unamused, but I looked over at the bar. It looked fairly intact. I'd never really drunk before, never saw the point in risking getting arrested just for a few hours of being stupid followed by a hangover. But now? Now I really needed one.

"Mind if I have a drink Mr. Stark?" I asked as the man with the bow handcuffed Loki and Captain Rogers contacted the Helicarrier. Mr. Stark winced.

"Never call me that again and you can have a whole bottle." I blinked.

"Then what do I call you?"

"Tony's fine." He said dismissively.

"…Alright then." I said slowly, and somewhat uncomfortably. I headed over towards the bar when Natasha stopped me.

"No." She said flatly.

"I…what do you mean no?" I demanded indignantly.

"C'mon Romanoff, we can all use a drink." Mr…Tony said, rolling his eyes and heading for the bar himself.

"Stark, she's eighteen." Natasha said flatly. Tony paused and looked at me, then at the bottle of rum he was holding.

"Sorry kid, I'm not getting arrested just so you can get drunk."

"I hate you right now." I said, glaring at Natasha, who shrugged.

**Fifteen minutes later**

We sat in silence around a table in an impressively intact restaurant, all things considered. I mean, yeah, there was rubble strewn about, but the walls were large hole free, as was the roof, and they were capable of making us food, so they weren't doing too badly. As for the choice of food? Eh, it was fine. Frankly, how could we not go after finding out about a food called shawarma? That name is just begging people to try it!

_I still cannot believe that I was beaten by a group of people whose reaction to saving the world was to argue over underage drinking and then go try a new food (in full combat gear for four of you I might add) solely based on you being amused by the name._

Aw, you know you love our insanity.

**Author's Notes**

What'd you guys think? I wanted El to be involved in the plot, and this was the best way I could think of to do that, but, as always, I'm scared of falling into the OC becomes a Mary Sue trap. Was this a good way for her to save the day in your opinion?

Thanks for reading! Please review!


	4. Chapter 4

**Words in bold=POV shift**

_Words in italics=El or Loki interjecting in the other's narrative_

Words in underline=standard emphasis

Brackets=Loki responding to El when she interrupts his narrative

I walked up to the others with Tony, feeling rather uncomfortable as we gathered on the bridge. Frankly I hadn't wanted to come, but Tony had insisted. He and Natasha seemed rather exasperated with my lack of enthusiasm for my own role in the Battle of New York. I hadn't fought anything, so I wasn't of the opinion that I really deserved the praise that was occasionally thrown my way. Regardless, I was here now, and it was a little surreal. I already knew that my soulmate was an arrogant homicidal maniac

_I think they get it. You can stop hammering that point in now._

That's the last time I'll bring it up, I swear. Aside from, you know, the times I said it to your face on Asgard. At any rate, I already knew…that. But the fact that he was a virtually immortal alien hadn't really clicked until just then. We gathered around Loki and Thor, Natasha whispering something in Clint's ear that made him smirk at Loki, who was scanning the group. Somehow he managed to smirk at me with just his eyes, making me shift even more uncomfortably. Thor nodded at us, then twisted the handle on the Tesseract's container, beaming himself and Loki away. We parted ways then, shaking hands and saying goodbyes, and I climbed into the back of Tony's cherry red Camaro as Bruce got into the shotgun seat. As we drove away, Tony looked at me through the rear view mirror and shook his head. "What?" I groaned.

"You're very difficult, you know that?" He said with a smirk. "You just met your soulmate. I'm supposed to be teasing you about that. El and Loki, kissing in a tree. K-I-S-S-I-N-G. But I can't really do that because, you know, your soulmate's a bit of an asshole who probably won't ever."

"There's more to me than being Loki's soulmate you know." I pointed out wearily. Tony laughed.

"Yeah, but that's the funniest thing." He said in defense of himself. "You sure you want to go home right away? I have some tests I want to run."

"I do have a family I need to get back to." I reminded him.

"Eh, fair enough." He admitted. "You're not abandoning me, are you?" Tony asked with a grin, turning and looking at Bruce, who rolled his eyes.

"No Tony, I'm not 'abandoning' you." He said with a shake of his head.

"Oh good, at least I'll have my science buddy with me." Tony said, faking relief. He glanced over at me. "Fury said he'd get one of his agents to pick you up and take you home in a Quinjet." I nodded my thanks.

**Twelve hours later**

I shifted nervously. Not long after the SHIELD agent had explained the situation and where I'd been to my parents, going into an uncomfortable level of detail (by which I mean he told the truth and had them sign nondisclosure forms) I'd been told to go sit on the couch while my siblings were being sent to their rooms. After a few minutes my parents came into the living room, my father closing the door behind him. I winced at the look on his face as my mother sat down, staring at me in disappointment. "What the hell?!" My father snapped, making me flinch.

"Sorry." I muttered, looking at the floor.

"Oh, that makes everything better!" He snapped.

"Look at us when we're talking to you." My mother said sternly. I reluctantly looked up.

"Do you even know what you're apologizing for?"

"Being me?"

"Being me." My father said mockingly. "Don't act like none of this was a choice." I swallowed hard.

"I helped save the world." I pointed out softly.

"We'll get to that in a minute." My mother said, sounding calmer than my father but just as angry. "First let's talk about what you did in Germany. We couldn't find you. Do you know how hard it was for your father and I to explain to your siblings that you weren't coming with us?"

"Sorry."

"You better be sorry!" My father snapped, still pacing. "And then…and then…magic!?" He stopped and glared at me. "You did magic?"

"I saved the world." I repeated softly.

"Because the ends justify the means. Yeah, that's what we've taught you." My father snapped sarcastically.

"It…it's just magic. It's energy."

"That's not true." My mother interrupted. "You know it's not true. Witchcraft is never a good thing."

"And to top it all off, your soulmate is Loki?" My father continued, glaring at me as if that was my idea. "The Norse 'god' of lies and chaos? Do you really think you can still claim that what you've done was right?"

I looked at them and realized that this was not going to end well. No matter what I said, no matter what I did, they were going to be mad. I'd pushed them too far, and I'd delivered the straw that broke the camel's back. I'd destroyed my relationship with my family, and I had nobody to blame but myself. So, I stood up.

"I…I'm sorry. I…didn't mean to hurt…I'll leave now. You won't have to see me anymore." I left the room, and they didn't stop me. I packed up a duffel bag, and they didn't stop me. I left the house, and they didn't stop me.

_I need to go get a drink._

Sit down.

_I truly am quite thirsty._

You're not an actual god of lies you know. I know when you're bullshitting, like you are now. You cannot smite my parents, now sit down.

_I do not understand why you refuse to allow me to punish those wastes of flesh as they deserve._

They're family. You don't hate family, no matter what they do. And it's not like I didn't do anything to cause that reaction.

_…Come here love. You did nothing to deserve that. Do you understand? You did not choose your soulmate, you did not choose to have magic, and you certainly did not deserve to be disowned for it._

Askhfladlgefadbhgohadbgol.

_…Pardon?_

You're really comfortable. Can I just spend the rest of the time cuddling into you?

_I'm afraid the transcribing device cannot translate you talking into my chest, so I have to say no._

Fine. Let's skip ahead a little bit, shall we?

**Three days later**

I stared at the front door of Stark Tower, (well, 'A' Tower now considering how the majority of the letters were missing) took a deep breath, and stepped inside. Surprisingly, the doors were unlocked and there was a secretary at a desk. "Uh, El Park to see Tony Stark." I said nervously once I'd reached the desk. The secretary gave me a skeptical look, and opened her mouth to say something, but JARVIS spoke up before she could.

"Mr. Stark has been notified of your arrival Miss Park." I looked up, startled.

"He has? That was fast."

"Sir asked to be notified if any members of the Avengers Initiative arrived while he was in the building." I blinked in confusion, and opened my mouth to point out that I had no connection with the Avengers aside from being in the same building and vehicle with them a few times, but the elevator opened and Tony stepped out before I could.

"Hey kid!" He said cheerfully, grinning. "Didn't expect to see you back for a while." Then he stopped, taking in my duffel bag and my rather messy appearance, and his grin faded. "What's up?"

"Uh…I need a job." I said slowly, awkwardly. "And a, uh, place to live would be nice too." He looked at me, glanced at the receptionist, and then nodded and waved me over.

"C'mon, let me introduce you to Pepper and we can talk." He said, guiding me into the elevator with him. There was a moment's silence, then he looked at me. "How'd you get here so quickly?"

"I, uh, found a flying spell in the book." Tony did a double take.

"You can fly now?" I nodded.

"I found the spell somewhere in…Colorado I think." I said. "It takes a lot of magic right now, but with practice it should get better, and it saved my shoes a lot of wear and tear."

"Why didn't you just land on the balcony then?" I shrugged.

"Considering what just happened, I figured flying in Manhattan was probably not a good idea. So I landed a little bit upstate last night and walked the rest of the way." He glanced at my shoes.

"I see." He said, nodding. The elevator dinged revealing the penthouse was still in its somewhat wrecked state.

"Huh. I figured you would have flown in some people to get working on this right away." I said, looking around. Tony shrugged.

"Eh, it's just the living room, and it's still livable. I figure the rest of Manhattan takes priority."

"Plus he's taking the time to redesign the whole place." A woman with strawberry blonde hair said from the couch, rolling her eyes fondly.

"Well, if this is going to be headquarters it's got to get some upgrades." Tony said semi-defensively, heading for the bar. "Better security systems, stronger windows, a suite for everybody, everything. It's actually a good thing you're here." He continued, looking at me. "It means you get to have a say in what your rooms look like. Everyone else'll just have to settle for choosing the decorations." I blinked.

"Wh…what do you mean, my rooms?"

"I just said there'd be a suite for everybody, didn't I?" Tony said as if it were obvious, pouring himself some whiskey.

"Yeah but…define everybody." Tony looked at me.

"The Avengers." I looked at him, then at the woman who I vaguely recognized from the news as his girlfriend and current CEO of Stark Industries Pepper Potts. Neither of them looked like Tony was joking.

"I…I'm not an Avenger." I said, baffled. "I'm the idiot who just happened to match Loki." Tony set down his drink, a deadpan look on his face.

"Kid, I crunched the numbers. About a hundred people died during the Battle of New York. If you hadn't closed the portal the number would have been closer to five hundred."

"I didn't do any actual fighting." I pointed out. "Hell, if it hadn't been for you, Thor, and Natasha I would have died of old age and the portal would have reopened."

"First off, the Avengers are a team. That's the whole idea, to take on the threats nobody could handle alone." Tony said. "And secondly, what part of you saved about four hundred lives did you not understand?" He sounded rather exasperated at that point. I opened my mouth to protest, to point out that if it weren't for them me shutting the portal wouldn't have done any good because there still would have been Chitauri rampaging, but he cut me off. "You're an Avenger El. Deal with it." Tony said, patting me on the shoulder as he walked by. He drained his glass and set it down on the table in front of the couch before turning to look at me. "So, why are you here, and why do you need a job and a place to live?" He asked, concerned.

"Well, SHIELD felt the need to have my parents sign nondisclosure forms, despite the fact that I'm eighteen and a legal adult, so the agent that dropped me off told my parents everything. And, as it turns out, telling my Christian Fundamentalist parents that I was a witch and the soulmate of a pagan god was not a good idea."

"So they kicked you out?" Pepper asked, sounding horrified.

"Not without reason." I said with a shrug. Pepper and Tony looked at each other, then Tony looked at me.

"Alright then. Well, you'll get the…" He bent down and picked a tablet up off the table. He ran his hand over the screen, and a 3d hologram of the Tower appeared in the air. He set the tablet down and used his hands to enlarge the hologram, focusing in on the top ten floors. "Floor right below this one, west side." Tony said finally after a moment's consideration. "Until then though, we've got a guest room up here." I nodded.

"Thanks." He gave me an easy grin.

"No problem kid. That's what friends are for."

**Author's Notes**

Let me make one thing very clear right now. The reactions of El's parents was in no way meant to be a slam against Christianity or religion in general. It's just…well, at some point El sort of became a self-insert. In that I based her appearance (pre magic hair color change) off of mine, since I'm pretty average and that's what I wanted El to look like, and then aspects of my personality bled into her and…yeah. El is in many ways what I wish I was, though she will of course have flaws because the point of this is to entertain you guys, not me, and nobody likes boring, perfect characters.

The reason I'm bringing this up is that, when it came time for El's parents to quite thoroughly reject her, I ended up adapting the situation that happened when I came out to my parents. And then when Loki is comforting El I ended up adapting the conversation my girlfriend and I had when I told her the story for the first time. So…yeah. Not a slam on Christianity, just life translated into fiction.

As always, let me know if you feel that El has become a Mary Sue.

Thanks for reading! Please review!


	5. Chapter 5

**Words in bold=POV shift**

_Words in italics=El or Loki interjecting in the other's narrative_

Words in underline=standard emphasis

Brackets=Loki responding to El when she interrupts his narrative

I looked around nervously. "Uh, Tony, are you sure about this?" Tony looked up from his computer with a grin. We were in a wrecked section of the R&amp;D area, with me standing in front of pressure scanner.

"Of course I'm sure. Would I bring you down here if I wasn't?" I looked at the scanner again, then back at him. Tony wanted to see how magic worked, and once he learned that I had a spell that made a blast of pure kinetic force there was no stopping him from dragging me down to a lab for testing said spell. I raised an eyebrow.

"Would Pepper be okay with this?" I asked skeptically. I'd only been at 'A' Tower (Tony insisted that from now on it should be called Avengers Tower, but I told him I'd be waiting until he fixed the letters on the building to do so) for four days now, but I'd quickly learned that Pepper was Tony's minder and he tried his hardest not to make her disappointed with him. Tony opened his mouth, paused, closed it, and then glared at me.

"Just shoot the spell already." He said, sitting down behind his computer. I rolled my eyes and turned my attention fully to the large round plate. I took a deep breath and began focusing magic into my hands.

"Come out and strike, Sentinel of the Wind." I thrust my hands out, focusing as hard as I could on the pressure sensor. Tony blinked, staring at the computer. I winced as the pressure sensor broke, revealing a huge crack in the wall.

"Ten thousand PSI." He said, blinking. "That's…pretty impressive." I was too busy wincing at the damage to the wall and the broken sensor to acknowledge the compliment. "Relax." Tony said, waving me off. "That wall was already broken, and I've got a dozen more sensors." There was an ominous cracking noise from the wall. "That being said, we should probably move to another floor." He continued, giving the wall a sideways glance. I nodded and backed away quickly, heading for the elevator.

**Five minutes later**

Tony and I were sitting on the couch of the game room, playing Tekken Tag Tournament 2, when Pepper walked in. "Do either of you know why one of the walls in the eighth R&amp;D floor just collapsed?" She asked in a voice that made it quite clear that she already knew the answer. Tony looked up from the game, letting me knock Jin out with Lili.

"Not a clue...Hey!" He snapped, glaring at me. "No fair, I wasn't looking." I stuck my tongue out at him and kept playing. Pepper sighed.

"JARVIS." The TV turned off.

"Hey!" Tony and I snapped.

"You cannot destroy the tower." Pepper said sternly. "It's difficult enough repairing this place without you two actively trashing parts of the building."

"Sorry." We said together.

"In my defense, it was Tony's idea." Tony glared at me and opened his mouth, but Pepper cut him off.

"I figured as much."

"Hey!" Tony protested. "You really think I'm that much less mature than an eighteen year old?" Pepper just gave him a dry look and he turned the TV back on, muttering under his breath as I laughed. "You get stupid drunk at a party fifty times and you're marked for life."

"I think fifty is a pretty low number." Pepper said, sitting on the couch next to Tony.

"Agreed." I said, knocking him out again.

"Dammit!" Tony groaned, looking like he was about to throw the controller. "That's it, we're playing Mario Kart." He got up and grabbed two Wii remotes, handing me one. I raised an eyebrow.

"You got Rosalina yet?" He snorted.

"I've got everyone."

"Then sure." I set down the Xbox controller and grabbed the Wii remote. Pepper sighed.

"Weren't you two saving the world two weeks ago?" She asked. We looked at each other. I'd long since given up on convincing the two that I hadn't really done much when compared to everyone else, if only because I didn't want to annoy them and I'd been told by my parents that self-depreciation was annoying. So now I just rolled with it.

"What's your point?" I asked. Tony nodded as the Wii turned on.

"I'm not seeing the connection Pep." Pepper rolled her eyes and flicked on the tablet she was holding, getting back to work while we played.

**Three hours later**

I sighed as Tony adjusted the cameras. "Hey, I won the bet fair and square." Tony said, looking up from the last one.

"You cheated and we both know it." I snapped.

"I never took my hands off the controller!"

"So you're saying that the power to the TV went off right as I was about to pass you as a coincidence?" I demanded skeptically.

"Power surges are bound to happen. I'll have to take a look at the arc reactor later." Tony said with a smile, taking a step back.

"Yeah, that's why the Wii didn't turn off, just the TV for a few seconds." I muttered before taking a deep breath. "Spirits of the air, oldest inhabitants of this world, allies of those who dwell on more than mere land, accept this my offering. Raise me up and cut my bonds." Immediately I rose up in the air, hovering about four feet off the ground. Tony frowned as he checked the computer screen.

"There's…nothing. No energy output, no manipulation of air…you're just flying." He said slowly, moving around to check on each of the cameras. "I don't get it, that shouldn't be possible. The camera could see how much kinetic energy you sent out last time." I shrugged, turning slowly in the air.

"That was a blast of kinetic energy." I pointed out. "The whole point of the spell was to make that energy. This just needs to make me fly."

"That makes no sense!" Tony protested. I shrugged again before doing a flip.

"It's magic, I don't need to explain it." Tony let out a growl of frustration.

**Author's Notes**

Thanks for reading guys! Please review!


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